Black & Blue
by Starfallen
Summary: "Every time you say you're learning…" Matt/Shannon. First fic since the Block hit. Reviews appreciated =)


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Black & Blue  
STARFALLEN

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Disclaimer: All characters involved in this story belong solely to WWE & Vince McMahon. Lyrics at bottom ("Black & Blue", which this fic follows) belong to Adam Duritz & Counting Crows. Lawsuits are not needed. =)

I heard or read once that what does not kill you will make you stronger. But I'm looking at him now, and he's so quiet his sobs sound like sighs and I know what does not kill him now will kill him eventually. I see it in his eyes. I smell it in his hair. I hear it in his silence.

I know this and I am still yelling. Still pointing out his faults. Still trying to make him stronger. And he sucks it in and smiles and nods but really he's thinking, "I hate you I hate you I hate you… I love you."

And what do you know. I love him too. Even if I won't admit it.

I love him more than I've loved anybody in my life but even more I love how I can break him. I love the fear I smell in every delicate strand of his wine-washed golden hair. I love the pain I see behind the shattered shimmer of cerulean, hidden further by his ash-black eyelashes that flutter every time I shout dissatisfactions. I love it because I know I'm the only one who can fix it.

So I wait. And he continues sailing through the pain.

"I'm sorry," I hear him plead, almost as much as I hear him thinking, "hateyouloveyou". "I'm learning," he says. "I'm sorry. I'm still learning."

And I tilt my head and reply, "Damn straight you are," but what I really mean is, "You look a lot like I did before I found you."

He lowers his gaze and nods, blond hair falling in showers around his face, framing his flushed forehead as his eyes remain locked on the floor. He doesn't know why I do this to him. He doesn't know how I can possibly be so cruel to him when I have always been so kind and gentle.

He shrugs his shoulders and mumbles, "I tried my hardest."

This could be any other night in any other room with any other cheap fluorescent light hanging from the ceiling and I could walk out, any other time. The room could be dark and cold, and he could be naked and broken, and I could walk out and still hear his fragmented sobs and sighs and I would keep smiling. And he would be in there, scratching his wrists with his fingernails because there was nothing sharp enough to dig into his layers of skin and blood and bone and muscle like I did. Because he hates himself and he hates me. And he loves me. And he hates himself for loving me.

He hates how my face makes him cry. How his throat can never swallow those tears even when my dark eyes and high, pale cheeks are missing from his view. He hates how he can never find the courage to slide that fucking razor across his blue spider wrists. How he writes and rewrites that single fucking word he ends up burning anyway because _he can't do it._ Because he'll miss me too much. Because he loves me. Because he hates me. And most of all because I'm not a good enough reason to say goodbye.

Because I was never good enough anyway.

And if this was any other night, I would walk out with a smile. I could walk out of the sweat-smelling cheap-lighted locker room and find a taxi to take me to my hotel room for the night where I would take the extra key so he couldn't get in. And then ridicule him the next day for sleeping in the hotel lobby.

But tonight is different. Tonight I hear him as I have not hear him since we began sleeping alone.

"Why do you hate me?"

His voice is calm and scratchy like his throat has been crying even before his eyes have. I stare at his delicate features with surprise. His broken eyes stare back, boring a hole in mine.

"Why do you hate me?" he repeats. "I do everything for you. I run your errands. I fight your matches. I help you cheat. I help you win, most of the time. I do everything for you. I listen to you scold me, and I smile. I smile even though I know you think I'm stupid and worthless. And I keep trying. And I keep waiting. And all I get is reprimanded because all you care about is yourself."

He pauses to wipe his nose with the back of his arm, and then continues softly: "Is it my fault all I care about is you too?"

I try to say something, but the only sound coming out of my little o-shaped mouth is hesitant sighing. And he's looking so expectantly at me. I look away before I can speak.

"You know I can't offer you anything."

I don't have to look at him to know that he's frowning, cute disapproving wrinkles webbing across his face like his spider veins. And I can hear tiny hiccup-sobs again.

"No," he whispers, "I'm making the offer. Me, to you. I'm just… tired of feeling nothing. I'm tired of sleeping without you."

Still unable to face him, I lean my head against the cool chipped-paint locker room wall. I hear him breathing. If I turn around he'll be on his knees and crying, sweat and tears and frustration in his palms matting his beautiful hair. If I turn around I'll forget who I am and I might not know him either.

If I stay where I am, I can still break him. As long as my forehead is intact with this sticky-finger-printed, painted and painted again, safe strong wall, I will hurt him and he will break for good.

And then I think, maybe it's time to fix things. Maybe I have to not be Matt and he has to not be Shannon because we're both just tired of the pain. He's tired of being hurt and I'm tired of hurting him. And I'm tired of being scared that I might wake up one day with a note on the table and blood in the bathtub.

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I'm tired of feeling nothing. Goodbye.

So I turn around and there he is on his knees crying as I imagined he would be. But I'm not smirking, satisfied. I kneel gently in front of him, putting my hand to his sweat-and-tear-streaked hair, brushing my fingertips against it but too afraid to let my fingers run through it.

His face is pink-splotched and beautiful and full of love as I whisper an apology. And he tilts his head, eyes red-rimmed with a deep blue forgiveness. In the same whisper, he says, "I'm tired of feeling nothing."

I pull him into me, and even though I could never say it, I think to him, "I love you."

"I love you," he whispers for the both of us.

I detach myself from his arms and he puts both of his hands on my face, stroking his fingers against every groove of my cheekbone, every tear-moistened eyelash, every line in my forehead stitched with pain and fear.

I'm afraid of the reality and consequence of this moment. Afraid of what people will say. Afraid of my own emotions. But most of all afraid that if I don't hang on to something this real, I will hear his goodbye echo in my vessels for eternities to come.

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I'm tired of feeling nothing. Goodbye.

I pull him into a sweaty embrace. I don't care what people will say. I just want to wake up tomorrow without his soft, shadowed hair against my bare chest; the sweaty hair on my neck prickling because I had this dream I fell down and he helped me up; and the note on the table will say, _Getting us breakfast. I love you. –Shannon_.

"I love you," I say to him for the first time.

"I've been waiting a long time…"

"Fall asleep next to me."

(Tonight I will have this dream I fall on my face and he picks me up, and when I wake up he will be asleep next to me, fingers curled around my hair and quiet breaths warming my neck as I slip back into slumber.)

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Black & Blue – Counting Crows

Fading everything to black & blue  
You look a lot like you'd shatter  
In the blink of an eye  
But you keep sailing right on through  
Every time you say you're learning  
You just look a lot like me  
Pale under the blistering sky  
White & redblack & blue

You've been waiting a long time  
To fall down on your knees  
Cut your hands  
Cut yourself until you bleed  
But fall asleep next to me

Wait for everyone to go away  
And in a dimly lit room  
Where you got nothing to hide  
Say your goodbyes  
Tell yourself we'll read a note that says,  
"I'm sorry everyone.  
I'm tired of feeling nothing. Goodbye."  
Wash your facedry your eyes

Cause you've been waiting a long time  
To fall down on your knees  
Cut your hands  
Cut your hands until you bleed  
But fall asleep next to me  
And have a dream  
I'm falling down on my face  
I scrape my knees  
I scrape my hands until they bleed  
Cause you're fast asleep next to me


End file.
